Condemned
by QueenOfCrazy
Summary: AU. She never could explain him. Or why she went back. Vanitas and Aqua.


**Condemned**

_As we lay in the wake of destruction._

They always told her what she was doing was just plain stupid. And she always knew that to them, that's exactly what it was. Sheer stupidity. She never tried to justify it. She never tried to explain to to anyone. Not even her closest friends. She knew she could talk for hours trying to explain why she did the things she did, but they'd never understand. She barely understood it herself.

She never could explain him. Or why she always went back.

She knew he was bad for her. She knew that he caused her a lot more misery than happiness. It wasn't meant to work that way, was it? It was meant to be happy and bright and perfect. That's what love was. Or at least that was what they'd told her when she was a little girl.

But she was beginning to think that wasn't love at all.

Maybe love was a deep, dark thing. Maybe it was violent and passionate and out of control. Maybe to truly know love, you had to hate them amost as much as you loved them. Yes, love wasn't that shiny bright happy bauble they waved in front of you as a child. True love was utter destruction and chaos.

And it was worth every single second of it.

She never brought her friends to the house they shared. They'd ask about the countless smashed items and holes in the walls. They'd jump to the wrong conclusion. They'd get that image in their minds of him hurting her. Maybe her heart had taken a thousand battle wounds, but he'd never laid a finger on her.

He'd punch out walls, destroy anything in sight. Because he'd rather set the whole world alight than ever hurt her.

They'd scream at each other till they were red in the face, their swords as sharp as knives. She'd storm away, sometimes just to another room, sometimes to the other side of town. When he could, he'd gently grab her wrist, careful not to bruise her, he'd shout something about the fight not being over. But really, he just couldn't stand the thought of her walking away from him. Because every time she did, he feared that was the final straw. She wasn't coming back.

But sometimes, she'd be out of his reach before he could react. He'd follow her like a lost puppy then, to the ends of the earth if that was where she went to. Anything to stay by her side.

Once she'd screamed that he was evil. That his soul was as bllack as coal. That he was nothing more than a monster in human form. And as she shut her eyes, looking away from him, another few words lingered in the air between them.

_'But I'll always love you anyway.'_

When it started, she wanted to hate him. Sometimes she still did. But by then she knew was love really was, it was hating someone almost as much as you loved them. She screamed those three words at him often.

_'I hate you.'_

And he'd scream them right back.

But then, a few hours later, he'd approach her and ever so lightly, brush his fingertip against her cheek, a simple gesture that meant, from him anyway, _'I'm sorry...I don't mean it...I love you.'_

A tiny smile would tug at her lips and he'd know he was forgiven, and that she was sorry in return. It was rare that they'd actually say those three little words out loud. They didn't need to. Anyone who could see through the anger and the fighting would be abe to see it. That look when their eye's locked, even if it was only for a moment.

Her friends always told her there were hundreds of signs that all they shared was hate. But if there were hundreds of signs of their hatred for each other, there were thousands of their love for each other.

The way he brushed his finger through her hair. The bruising kisses. The tiny scratch marks on his back. The way, that after a fight when she'd sit on the porch in the darkness, he'd drape a blanket over her shoulders and press his lips to the top of her head. The way she could quell his anger with a single touch. The way they'd bask in each others presence after the fights finally ended.

The way that with the slightest touch, she'd know how much he loved her and with her gaze, he'd know just how little she really hated him. They'd both feel like they could live forever just by staying by each others side.

Yes, Aqua never _could _explain her love for Vanitas. Not to Terra, Not to Ven. Not to anyone. It took her many years to realise it but their problem had never been that they hated each other so much. No, they were so hopelessly in love with one another that they didn't know what to do with each other. Because when he was with her, he didn't care about how mucht he rest of the world hated him. Because when she was with him, she didn't give a damn about how everyone else looked down on her for going back to him.

Because it didn't matter. Those moment of lying next to each other with the first lights of the day dancing upon their skin, speaking in hushed tones. It was those moments that she knew she didn't hate him as much as she said she did. And he didn't despise her like he always shouted he did.

They were hopeless. Hopeless with each other and hopeless without each other. But they loved each other so competely, it really didn't matter to either of them. The rest of the world could go to hell.

After all, hadn't they all condemned the two of them long ago?


End file.
